The subject matter herein generally relates to connector assemblies and, more particularly, to a connector assembly having a plurality of contacts.
Circuit boards may be electrically connected by mating a connector mounted on each circuit board with one another. The circuit boards may be electrically connected in order to pass, or communicate, data and/or power between the circuit boards. For example, power from one circuit board may pass through one or more conductive traces in the circuit board, through contacts in the connector that is mounted to the circuit board and to contacts in a connector that is mounted to the other circuit board. The connector on the other circuit board may then communicate the power to one or more conductive traces in that circuit board.
Some known connectors that are used to communicate power between circuit boards include individual contacts for each conductive trace in the respective circuit boards. The contacts in these connectors may be spaced too closely together such that adjacent conductive traces in the circuit board to which the connector is mounted also may be spaced too closely together. Arcing and/or shorting between adjacent conductive traces may result if the conductive traces are spaced too closely together. Increasing the spacing between the conductive traces with known electrical connectors would require increasing the spacing between the individual contacts in the connectors. Yet, increasing the spacing between the individual contacts requires increasing the size of the connector. Increasing the size of the connector can result in waste of the limited amount of available real estate on the circuit board.
Thus, a need exists for a connector capable of communicating power between circuit boards while reducing the risk of arcing and/or shorting between the conductive traces in the circuit boards. Moreover, a need exists for such a connector while not increasing the size of the connector.